The World Wide Web (or simply, the “Web”) has become a readily available and extensive source of information and other resources to users of personal computers and workstations. Indeed, the explosive growth of the Web and the volume of information available, has complicated the user's task of locating the desired information. The user must spend increasing amounts of time performing keyword-based searches on one or more of the search engines available on the Web, or traversing links via portal sites in search of the information the user seeks. Additionally, search engine and portal providers commonly have only limited information which they use to present first-order search results, or top-level navigation links, respectively. Often, the limited information may be restricted to the simple keywords provided to the search. At best, a site might provide for site-specific personalization/preferences settings. Once created, these preferences are only available at that site. Moreover, these preference settings may not capture the full range of interests of the user. Thus, users must still perform manual filtering through search results or navigate through layers of content.
As a practical matter, it is difficult for a site to foresee, at a sufficiently granular level, the potential interests of its individual users. Although a provider can ask about preferences or interests, it cannot anticipate the essentially unlimited range of interests a user might have. Moreover, it is impractical for a provider to save and manage such data for each of its users.
Consequently, there is a need in the art for systems and methods that may be used by an individual to describe his or her interests, and that can then be used by a portal or search engine to customize portal links or automatically refine searches based on the user's personalized interests.